


sometimes (I wish)

by 1001cranes



Category: Heroes - Fandom
Genre: Family, M/M, Telepathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-05
Updated: 2011-08-05
Packaged: 2017-10-22 05:49:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,432
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/234557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/1001cranes/pseuds/1001cranes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It’s two men, a girl, and a puppy all living in a shabby Brooklyn apartment  that even Mohinder admits might be getting too small. It's love.</p>
            </blockquote>





	sometimes (I wish)

**Author's Note:**

> Spoilers through 2.03, although a little AU of that.

Matt stops reading minds.

Mainly because it’s an invasion of privacy – Mohinder can give an unsurprisingly convincing lecture on any given subject to the point that Matt just _concedes_ these days – but also because it tends to drive him a little insane. It’s a real downer, if you want the truth, listening to people gossip and bitch, catching wave after wave of depression and anger and sorrow and anxiety and worry and fear. He keeps a sense out for anyone whose thoughts scream “murder!” or “suicide!” or “I’m a crazed psycho killer who likes to eat brains!,” but mostly telepathy gives him headaches. It’s not worth the drama.

~

People say big cities are all alike, but New York is light years away from Los Angeles. Less lights and glamour and falseness, more grit and blood and in-your-face craziness. It’s about as insane as television makes it seem.

Matt transfers there with relative ease; his job back home is a joke and his marriage is the punchline. He does it for those reasons, for a fresh start, but also because Molly needs him. Molly would be okay with Mohinder – probably even better off, if Matt’s being honest – but Mohinder is on a vendetta against The Company with a quiet, cool calm that belies the intensity of his anger and the depths to which he would go. They both agree that Molly doesn’t need to be any part of that. Molly has spent enough time in the clutches of The Company. Her gift has been manipulated enough. There might come a day when Matt and Mohinder have to ask her to find someone – Mohinder isn’t completely convinced Sylar still isn’t around – but she needs to have the right to refuse.

~

Matt and Molly settle into Mohinder’s apartment better than anyone would have thought, and they have a few months of relative calm while Bennet puts things into motion and relocates his own family. Matt spends his days jumping through hoops for the department, but he’s the new guy so that’s expected, and at least he has some chance of proving himself here. Mohinder works on his research during the day and cooks dinner at night. He helps Molly with her homework, too. Matt’s dyslexia is still too much of a sore point for that, but he’s always up for making a paper mache solar system or going to parents’ day, since ‘cop’ is a little easier to explain to third graders than ‘genetic theorist’. Plus, Janice has trained him to do laundry and wash dishes, which Mohinder, for all his scientific genius, can’t seem to do without tinting clothes pink or leaving water marks all over the silverware.

The first may partly explain his fashion choices.

~

Molly’s nightmares come more frequently in the first few weeks after Mohinder’s whirlwind lecture tour begins. Matt supposes it’s inevitable, really, when you’re ten and just about every change in your life has come about as the result of A Very Bad Thing.

The real surprise is that Matt misses Mohinder. Misses him more than he would have guessed. In ways he wouldn’t have guessed. Matt misses coming home to Mohinder’s cooking, and the clacking of Mohinder typing on his laptop while Molly watches _Hannah Montana_ , and wondering exactly _where_ Mohinder gets those shirts when he does the laundry. He misses the messages waiting for him at the station, asking him to buy milk and dish soap or cumin and turmeric, even though it usually takes him half an hour to figure out what something like turmeric is. He misses their new puppy Sid yapping at the door every time Mohinder comes home. He misses losing at Scrabble and sometimes winning Monopoly and never, ever being able to beat Molly at Cadoo even when he and Mohinder team up.

It’s a long few weeks. He and Molly do as best as they can, but Matt is woefully aware that pizza is not the healthiest dinner for a third grader, and that he can’t help Molly with her science homework. His protective instincts go on overtime without Mohinder there to temper them, and sometimes Matt catches Molly looking at him as if he was being adorable but slightly insane, which probably isn’t too far off the mark.

Mohinder calls three or four times a week, and spends about half an hour talking to Molly about school and Sid and if she’s been eating right – she tries to cover for him, bless her – and her best friend Helen and what city he’s in this week and what’s the weather like and what language do they speak there and do they eat weird things, like snails? By the time she passes the phone to Matt he’s already wincing at the thought of the phone bill.

“Hello.” Mohinder’s voice is always a little crackly over international lines, but he sounds amused. “Have you been feeding her sugar again?”

“I have no idea where you’d get that impression, Dr. Suresh.”

Their conversations are much shorter, but just as comfortable. They chat about Molly and things around the apartment, how Matt’s job is going, how Mohinder’s lectures are being received. Mohinder can’t say anything important about The Company over the phone, and Matt tells himself that’s the real reason he’s so impatient to see Mohinder again.

~

Mohinder doesn’t tell anyone he’s coming back. He just shows up. Matt finds him in the kitchen one morning, cooking pancakes and feeding Sid bacon bits. He’s wearing worn-out jeans and an orange t-shirt that should make him look like an overlarge Dorito but somehow isn’t the least bit ridiculous. Maybe Mohinder has a superpower after all.

“You know that’s bad for him,” Matt says good-naturedly, reaching up to scratch at the stubble on his face. He never tries to shave before coffee.

Mohinder’s smile is a bright, quick thing. “Fried food isn’t good for anyone.”

“Fair enough.” Matt pulls a mug out of the cabinet with some satisfaction. Mohinder has already started the coffeemaker. “Want to go wake up Molly?”

Mohinder looks askance at the pancakes, and you don’t have to be telepathic to know what he’s thinking.

“I may not be the chef you are, but I can handle pancakes, thanks.” A faint blush appears on Mohinder’s face. Matt takes pity on him, picking up the spatula and waving it menacingly at Mohinder’s head. “Go on, Suresh. I’m trained in the use of lethal weaponry. And Molly prefers you to pancakes anyway.”

Another one of Mohinder’s brilliant smiles, and Matt is left alone to puzzle out the mystery of perfectly flipped pancakes, and not why he’s suddenly so happy.

Mohinder drops Molly off at school before heading to bed. Matt washes the breakfast dishes and sorts Mohinder’s laundry into dirty, dirtier, and going to need Extra Special Care. He throws out all the socks before heading to work.

~

Mohinder would say change is a force slow but sure. Matt’s okay with it. Okay with his new life, with his new family – one that doesn’t involve Janice and probably won’t involve their child, but that thought hurts less and less lately. Molly is. Molly is beautiful, and smart, and pushing her on the swings or taking her to Starbucks so she can feel grown-up ordering raspberry hot chocolate or reading her _A Little Princess_ – whatever it is, it’s always the happiest moment of his life, and it doesn’t escape his notice that usually Mohinder is right there with him, smiling alongside.

There are other things that do not escape Matt’s notice (except maybe their significance) –

On bitter cold winter mornings he grabs one of Mohinder’s many outrageous scarves to wear to work.

Sometimes when he gets up to check on Molly in the middle of the night he runs into Mohinder doing the same thing.

When Sid gets ticks Mohinder helps Molly administer the flea-guard without a word of complaint even though he _said_ this would happen. Matt discreetly cleans all the bed linens.

Every day he comes home to dinner and board games and homework and he’s able to laugh, even if that same day there were three domestic calls and one homicide.

His life becomes hugs goodnight and pancakes on the weekends and buying Molly watercolors for Christmas and pizza and going to the park and waking up with Sid at the foot of the bed and sleeping better than he has in years, being happier than he ever was.

He notices, really, but this is how it hits him –

Matt pulls a shift and a half, then spends a few extra hours doing legwork on a nasty homicide case and thinking of a birthday gift for Molly – it’s cheating if he tries to read her thoughts, apparently – before heading home. When he opens the door it smells like curry and tea and wet puppy. Molly’s at the table doing her homework, or probably drawing, but as long as her homework actually gets done neither he nor Mohinder will say anything. Mohinder is at the stove making aviyal – heavy on the coconut for Molly and without tomatoes for Matt – pushing Sid away with his foot.

And this moment. This _moment_. Everything warm and sweet and… oh, god, beautiful, and it was never like this was Janice. Was never simple. Nothing about Janice snuck up on him – it always hit him like a ton of bricks. This – he’s not used to this.

He stands in the entryway like an idiot, door swung open behind him until Sid makes a run for it and Matt is obliged to catch fifteen-plus pounds of wriggling puppy and put him in his pen.

He’s a little slow walking back into the kitchen, and he sits down heavily in the chair next to Molly.

“You okay?” She wrinkles her nose up at him, something of the old fear jumping into her eyes. He doesn’t have to be telepathic to know what she’s thinking, and he’s quick to reassure her.

“Fine. I’m fine. Long day at work, that’s all.”

“We weren’t expecting you so late,” Mohinder added mildly, before bringing Matt over a cup of coffee. “Extra shift?”

“A little overtime.” Mohinder’s hand rests briefly on Matt’s shoulder, squeezing quickly and then gone.

Sometime Matt wishes he still read minds.

~

Mohinder puts Molly to bed that night. They read the next chapter of _The Thief Lord_ , the part right before Scipio getting on the merry-go-round. Matt listens for a few minutes at the door, then heads into the living room to sit down on the couch and unwind in front of some mindless sitcom. He zones out a little, not really thinking about anything, just letting it all go grey, and he’s startled when Mohinder comes into the room.

Mohinder smiles a little, and rests his forearms on the back of the couch. “Difficult day?”

Matt shrugs. “A few hours too long, maybe.”

“Fair enough.” Mohinder’s face is a study in calm. “You just looked a little gobsmacked when you came in the door.”

“I guess it just hit me. This.”

“This?”

“Living here. You, me, Molly. My life.” Living in a tiny apartment in Brooklyn with an instant ten-year-old daughter and her co-guardian. “I mean, Mohinder, where were you a year ago? Where did you expect yourself to be?”

“Regrets,” Mohinder says softly. “You must have a great many of them.”

Matt blinks for a moment, taken aback. “Not regrets, no. Not that I don’t miss Janice, because I do.” Sometimes its like he’s been shot all over again when the thought hits him – that he won’t smell her hair when he wakes up, or see her face next to his on the pillow. But there’s no going back to that, and he knows it. “But I’m happy here, Mohinder, with you.” Something softens in Mohinder’s face, something Matt ignores, and he goes on quickly. “ – and Molly. In New York, doing what I’m doing.” Matt rubs a little at his temples. There’s a bit of an ache there, a remnant of poking through the thoughts of a suspect earlier in the day. “I don’t know. I just wish we had this Company business out of the way, you know?”

“As do I,” Mohinder agrees, coming around the end of the couch to sit down next to Matt. “Believe me, I know how you’re feeling. But the truth of the matter is I’ll probably have to work there for several months before everything is said and done.” He shrugs his shoulders in an elegant what-can-you-do sort of motion. “At least I’ll have somewhat free reign of the lab there until then.”

“How’s the research going? Did you get anything done while you were lecturing?”

Mohinder’s mouth twists into a frown. “I’m still no further on finding any of the people still on my father’s map. Whether they’ve gone underground or Sylar got to them first is anyone’s guess.”

And that’s nothing that bears thinking about.

Matt sighs a little, tries to convince himself to get up off the couch and into bed. He’s got an early day tomorrow and he should just get away from Mohinder, even, before he does something stupid – even if he’s not quite sure what that something stupid would be yet.

“Goodnight, Mohinder.” And he leans in when he says it. Leans in a bit too close, enough to be able to breathe in and smell Mohinder – _smell_ Mohinder, and, okay, Matt _needs_ to go to bed. “Goodnight,” he says again.

Mohinder hesitates. Not just for a split second, but for two, three, four. Like he was coming to come kind of decision. “Goodnight, Matt.”

And it’s interesting. It catches Matt’s attention – he’s a cop, all right? Interesting gets him going. He was just wondering what Mohinder was going to say, maybe, but Matt gets a little too intense and concentrates a little _too_ hard, and he catches the tail end of Mohinder’s thoughts.

– _I shouldn’t_ –

– _why doesn’t he_ –

– _mistake_ –

Right after he reads someone’s mind, Matt always looks like a fish out of water or as if someone slapped him in the face. Mohinder must have realized what just happened.

“I…” Matt can feel a blush rising to his face. “Sorry, I just… I didn’t mean to, I, uh. I still slip sometimes.” His control has been better these past few months, but when he gets too focused or when he lets his guard down, things just creep in.

Mohinder rests his hands in his lap. “What did you hear?”

“Nothing, I don’t think. Just…” Matt makes a little gesture with his hands. “Bits. I don’t know.”

He thinks he knows.

“Don’t you?”

“I…” His mouth is suddenly dry. “What were you thinking?”

“That I missed you,” Mohinder finally says, and the words reverberate in Matt’s head, like feedback, like he heard them from Mohinder’s mouth and mind at the same time. “On the trip. I kept thinking about how I missed you.”

“Missed _me_?” Matt asks skeptically, defensively. “You missed being growled at first thing in the morning? How nine times out of ten I’m late to pick up Molly at school? We’ve been surviving on _really_ bad fast food these past few weeks – I’m not kidding. Does tomato sauce count as a vegetable? What about the time I almost shot you when you got up to make tea in the middle of the night?”

Matt’s being a little obtuse, maybe, but so’s Mohinder. Mohinder said missed but Matt thinks he means _missed_ and he just. doesn’t. get it.

Matt’s an okay guy. A decent guy. He’s a _nice_ guy, all right? He’s a cop, he’s blue-collar, he’s a Detective now and he might make Sergeant or Lieutenant by the time he retires – Captain if he’s very, very lucky. He likes watching baseball while eating pizza and drinking beer, and he’s not a big fan of books or exercise. He’ll never make what Mohinder could at a university job. He’ll never be half as brilliant. He’ll never look as half as beautiful as Mohinder does every day. He’ll never _be_ half of what Mohinder is, superpower or not.

“I missed the man who moved three thousand miles cross-country for a daughter that wasn’t even his,” Mohinder says evenly. “I missed the man who bought Molly a puppy just because she wanted one. I missed the man who does the laundry and the dishes and brings Molly to the park every day without one word of complaint. I missed knowing there was someone I could talk to anything about. I missed knowing there was someone watching my back. I missed the man who does the right thing even when it’s not good for him. I missed your smile.”

He doesn’t sound like he’s going to stop there, and Matt is already destroyed.

“Mohinder.”

“Read my mind, if you like. I’ve got nothing to hide.”

Matt doubts that, and wants to laugh a little but it catches in the back of his throat. “I’m afraid to.”

“Well,” Mohinder says smoothly, one hand on the side of Matt’s face, thumb scratching gently at the stubble there. “You really don’t have to be telepathic for this.”

~

Matt stops reading minds.

Well, okay, most of the time.

He learns that it’s okay to peek into Molly’s mind and see how she’s feeling – only _how_ she’s feeling, not _why_ she’s feeling it – and see if maybe a little chocolate ice cream isn’t out of order. He runs a sweep over the building in the morning and at night, to make sure Mrs. Collins on the sixth floor hasn’t broken her hip again. He uses it on Mohinder too. With Mohinder, really. In emergencies, or when Mohinder tells him he can. They develop a method of talking over Molly’s head when she’s acting out or she wants something they aren’t sure they should give her – just like parents everywhere, but with the bonus of _actual_ telepathy. She doesn’t have a chance in hell of winning the “did you ask your father?” game, poor kid.

At work he uses it on perps and suspects and sometimes the witnesses too. And yeah, it’s an unfair advantage, but no matter how many times Molly glowers or how many well thought-out points Mohinder makes Matt won’t back down on this. He can’t let some slimeball get off or persecute someone who’s innocent when he can pop into their heads and see the truth for himself. He just can’t have another Sylar on his conscience. Always in the back of his mind.

Sometimes Mohinder experiments with Matt’s abilities – trying to figure out a way to read the minds of people who think in other languages, or weed out things that people might not even be consciously thinking about. It always ends with Matt popping aspirin like they were candy, but someday he could use this kind of control to help them, to keep his family safe. Headaches are a small price to pay.

Rarest of all are the moments that come when Matt and Mohinder are in bed, and things come to Matt in sudden, quick flashes that might be telepathy, maybe just _knowing_ what Mohinder needs. There are no headaches there. No weird playback. Mohinder posits that it’s an instinctive method of feedback, something like verbal cues for the mind, but, hey, like Matt cares about the _why_.

It’s not all sunshine and rainbows. Some days it’s more like a curse than a gift. Sometimes Matt would give anything to get the screams out of his head, to wipe away the voice from Molly’s nightmares. Mostly, though, he just wishes she didn’t have them at all, and that he could live in a world where people didn’t have to carry around such awful things in their heads. They’re still working on destroying The Company. Still keeping one ear to the ground about Sylar. Still looking for other people like Matt and Molly.

But most of the time it’s normal. It’s Matt studying for his Sergeant exam and Mohinder researching the human genome and Molly petitioning for ballet lessons in increasingly imaginative ways. Mohinder makes sure everyone eats enough vegetables, except on Friday nights when Matt makes sure everyone has enough Skittles-popcorn-Raisinets for the movie. It’s two men, a girl, and a puppy all living in a shabby Brooklyn apartment that even Mohinder admits might be getting too small. It’s not easy, and there are plenty of things in their lives that still need fixing, but nothing they can’t work around. Nothing they can’t fix somehow. Mohinder never has to reassure him of that. Matt knows it already.


End file.
